Total pages in book: 191
Estimated words: 182070 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 910(@200wpm)___ 728(@250wpm)___ 607(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 182070 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 910(@200wpm)___ 728(@250wpm)___ 607(@300wpm)
He was saying….
He was trying to tell me….
I forced my eyelids not to blink, thought about it a little more, and asked again. “Zac?”
He leaned back into the door and crossed his arms over his chest, looking smug and good and still relieved. “Yes, sweetheart?” he asked with so much love and patience, I didn’t know what to do with it even more.
“Why are you really here?”
“’Cause I love you,” Zac answered.
I glanced away again. I wasn’t going to look at him. I couldn’t. But I would tell him the truth. “You literally said to me that you didn’t think you would ever fall in love because you’d never be able to trust someone enough to do that,” I admitted, willing my heart to be reasonable. To be smart. To not jump the fucking gun and start imagining all kinds of shit when it damn well knew better.
He made an amused sound that only made my heart drop. “True enough.”
I blinked and turned toward him again.
“But….” He trailed off.
I shoved my fingers under my thighs.
“You’re not just ‘somebody,’ are you, kiddo?”
The fuck did he just imply?
He kept talking. Because he couldn’t read my mind. His arms uncrossed, and he sat up straight in the small interior of his fancy car, his head millimeters from grazing the roof as he aimed that gaze straight at me with the strength of a thousand lighthouses. “And there was no fallin’ for you, Bianca. I just did. Just do, you know? Love you, I mean. It was like I told Boog, you snuck up behind me when I wasn’t lookin’ and beat the livin’ shit out of me ‘til I didn’t have a choice but to see you. See who you’ve become. See who you’ll be. You amaze me, kiddo. You’re gonna take over the world one day, and I wanna be there to see it. I wanna be there to help you any way I can. Lovin’ you is the easiest thing I’ve ever done, and it’s the easiest thing I’m ever gonna do. I just know it.” He paused, and his eyebrows went up at the same time his shoulders did. “I’ve never said that like that to anybody before, and I was a little scared, but I figured nothin’ could be worse than not sayin’ it and you leavin’, and wow… that actually felt right. Real right.”
I held my breath, and I’d swear I could hear my heartbeat. Maybe even his too. And right then, I felt like he could read my mind because he smiled at me, and it was tender and different and something I would remember for the rest of my life.
“I’ve missed the hell out of you,” he said, staring right at me.
Yep. I was going to pass out.
“Zac?” I whispered.
“Yes, darlin’?”
If I didn’t throw up, I was going to faint. Maybe throw up and then faint. Maybe shit myself too. Who knew?
But I was nobody’s coward. And I had to know. I had to. “Are you sure you… really feel that way about me?” I asked, swallowing. “Enough to say that? To Boogie? Because there’s friend-love and there’s—”
His hand settled on my thigh. Tilting my chin up, we made eye contact. “More sure than I am of anything.” He gave my leg a squeeze. “More sure than I am of myself. That’s what I wanted to tell you that day you left, but I didn’t know how. I’d never wanna make you pick, and I guess I was worried you’d pick Boogie. By the time I got home though, ready to tell you to gimme some time to sort things out, you were gone.”
I flicked myself on the chin just to make sure I wasn’t imagining it. I wasn’t. It stung.
And Zac saw it because he chuckled, his smile warm and eternal as his fingers moved to slide through mine. “I didn’t wanna risk ruinin’ what I got with Boogie, Bibi, but these last two weeks without you… I’ve been miserable. I wanted you back. I missed every single thing about you. And I had to think about what I had to offer you when you’ve got so much already goin’ on. Today I finally did the last thing I needed to before I could talk to you about it all. Before I felt like I could deserve to try.”
I pressed my lips together for about a split second, my nose tingling. My eyes burning. My soul screaming.
“Bibi?”
“Yes, Snack Pack?”
“Are you gonna ask if I’m sure I’m crazy about you?”
This idiot.
That finally had me digging in deep to figure out how I felt. And there was only one answer I could give him. “No, I wasn’t planning on it. Why wouldn’t you be?” I joked.
And I meant it.
All the little signs… the ones I’d ignored or taken to be something else—friendship, it had been a deep-rooted, immovable friendship—had been there along the way.